[justinhj]

There are skills involved, and I wouldn't say they were lesser than those needed for programming. But in the same vein, I'd say spending a few days learning to make bread to sell in a cart does not compare to the years it takes to become a competent programmer.

[jdmichal]

I would say that speaks more to the formalization of baking than anything else. Software engineering is so far interesting in the sense that it doesn't have a kind of "technical" employee. That is, there is a huge difference between someone who can bake bread from a recipe, and someone who can create that recipe to start with. The former is just being able to follow directions; the latter involves a lot of in-depth knowledge and experience about, for lack of a better term, baking chemistry. In the same line, a lot of traditional (physical) engineering professions can utilize drafters.

I guess the equivalent in software engineering would be someone who can only implement designs and algorithms from other people, and any ambiguities or questions about the design would result in them stopping work until a clarification is received from the "engineer".